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When using [kx]dm as prefdm (/etc/X11/prefdm) the directory /etc/X11/xdm/authdir does not exists, in which case the dm -failing to store xauth cookies- falls back to using xhost authentication. Any user on the system can now grab whatever display (either local or remote) has logged into the system, and wreck havoc. If not sure type xhost at an xterm to check for security. If it shows: inet:localhost LOCAL: (etc.), your authdir does not exist. Create it now, or fear the laughter of your colleages (filling your screen with garbage) :). ------- Additional Comments From 06/05/99 15:32 ------- This doesn t seem to happen with the alpha distrib ... (shouldn t they all come from the same .src, BTW ? or this is due do different SPECS files ?) But I confirm it on i386... The problem I have now, is that I canot xhost -localhost or xhost -Mylocdispname ... the command pass silently but tese entries remain in the list !
We will soon be putting out an errata release of X that explicitly packages the authdir. Under some (unexplored) circumstances, xdm will create the directory for itself, but we cannot rely on this happening. Thank you for the report.
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 2423 ***